"What did you do to him!?" Blake's voice was ragged and panting, as she grabbed her katana's handle. Opposing her, at the other side of Watts' laboratory, Sun Wukong was standing. His usual gentle demeanor had been pushed away, his eyes shining with a menacing green color.
The mad Atlasian was nowhere to be seen, but Blake knew he was around; after Atlas he had made it clear he liked seeing his victims suffer. "The same thing Ms. Schnee experienced back then" the voice was deep and had an air of absolution in it; the worst part was, it came straight out of her boyfriend's mouth.
Sun sprung in action. Four clones appeared in front of him, running towards Blake. She drew Nightfall, pressing the button that broke the magma-colored blade into six pieces, all held together by a durable carbon wire designed by her team leader.
Rapidly swinging her weapon like a whip and utilizing its ingenious gravity dust mechanism, the cat girl unleashed a cascade of slices that annihilated the attackers. As expected, Sun charged forward, aiming for her head with his staff.
She blinked away, allowing her clone to take the damage, using the momentum to retract her blade, slicing towards Sun's possessed faunus broke his weapon in two, unleashing a flurry of attacks with his gunchucks. She blinked once more at his back, but he was faster than her.
Creating a clone just at her landing point, he forced Blake to instantly teleport away once more- exactly where he knew she would; they had been training together for quite some time after all. The blonde charged at her, unleashing a devastating swirl of attacks, alternating gun shots with chuck strikes, not leaving her time to dodge away again.
Left arm, right elbow, gunshot! The sound of Nightfall parrying the attacks filled her ears, muffling her strained attempts to defend. Right leg, head, head, chest, shot! A furious rain of steel surrounded them, with only the shots from the boy's guns interrupting their duel.
Blake hadn't received any important injuries, but she knew there was no way out of this; Sun was both stronger and faster than her. She could defeat him if she used her semblance properly and infused dust into it, but this was out of the question for now- there was no way she would risk actually damaging him. Leg, leg, chest, neck, double shot! She suppressed a groan of pain as both shots found home, rattling her aura.
Taking advantage of her momentary shock, Sun downed both chucks at her shoulders, making her gasp in pain once more as she literally felt her bones cracking under the power. This is bad- I am losing! How am I supposed to stop Watts and help Sun like this?
She gritted her teeth, as her head became dizzy- and a paranoid thought came to her. As the boy leaned closer to finish her off, Blake used her semblance again- but this time remained at the same place. Sun had already anticipated that she would try get away, and was completely caught by surprise at her move.
Throwing all caution to the wind, she headbutted his stomach, feeling the strain of his aura absorbing the impact. Before he could even react and summon his clones, the cat girl swiped at his feet, throwing him on the ground.
She hastily unclasped Nightfall, using its wires to grab the falling faunus' arm, turning him over and forcing him to fall with his face to the ground, immediately jumping on his back and pinning him down. Adrenaline rushed her face, as she heard the man "hahahahaha…" laughing?
Blake blinked twice, the sound of Sun's gentle laughter filling her ears, accompanied by something else- applause. She looked around, and her eyes opened wide. Watts' laboratory, with all the weird lights and robotic parts spread around Grimm preserved in large tubes, was gone.
Instead, Blake found herself in the middle of a training arena, surrounded by Ozpin students who were looking at her in enthusiasm, clapping hands as she was sitting on top of- her yellow eyes opened wide when she realized she was literally sitting on top of Sun's back. "I am sorry, Sun!" she jumped back, helping the laughing blonde to his feet.
"That was a good match, Blake" he announced to the group of students, before turning back at her. She smiled meekly towards everyone, standing next to the young assistant professor, curtly bowing. "It was a good match Su- Junior Professor Wukong." She raised her head once more, stealing a quick glance of the man.
Sun had grown slightly taller, his unruly blonde hair and gentle blue eyes still adding to his honest and good-natured presence, a well-trimmed blonde beard the only notable change on his pleasant face.
His outfit, on the other hand, had been altered a lot, courtesy of Goodwitch who had nearly kicked him out when he first appeared with his unbuttoned shirt and trimmed jeans in the Academy. He now sported a red and white uniform, with tied-up buttons and high collar; Blake always thought he looked ridiculous in it.
"Well, everyone" he addressed the class "we are going to have a thirty-minute lunch break before I start getting you for exhibition matches. Give an applause to Blake for helping us with today's lesson." As the students around them started clapping in enthusiasm, she let her yellow eyes scan the room twice.
One, two…six of them looking at me as if I am a dirty piece of rotting meat. She sighed inwardly. I guess some things never change.
-ο-
"Here you are" Sun gave her one bottle of water, before sitting next to her in the empty classroom. "Thanks" she took the bottle, gulping it down thirstily and then lowering her head in his lap, using his legs as a pillow. He ran his hand through Blake's hair, earning a small smile in return.
"Sorry for pouncing on you at the end" she finally said. "It happened again, didn't it?" his voice was calm and soothing, but the mention made Blake stiffen a little. "I don't know what- ow!" she stopped replying, realizing the boy had just pulled her cat ear. "Don't you think that after a year of living together, I would be able to see through your lies?"
She closed her eyes, admitting her defeat."It was back at Watts' lab again. As soon as we grabbed the weapons, everything came to my mind" she snuggled at his lap even tighter. "The fight started exactly as I remember it, but…at some point I lost it again. I… didn't realize what was going on, until you started laughing."
He smiled "then I should laugh more; good to know." She narrowed her eyes "I am serious, Sun! I could have hurt you- again…" The boy narrowed his eyes too "didn't I tell you to stop thinking of that? It's gone, Blake. Passed, happened, gone."
She raised her body, now sitting next to the boy, and gently pressed her hand to Sun's chest "what I did to you will always remain here" she trailed her fingers over the scar she knew was hidden underneath "and that will not change- yep!"
Sun leaned forward and captured her lips, tenderly pushing her backwards for a few seconds before breaking away, smiling brightly. "You are so cute when caught off-guard; I never get tired of it- ouch!" he yelped in pain as the cat girl flicked his forehead.
"Can you be serious about, at least five minutes?" she groaned, her ears perked atop- an indication she was getting angry. "You are serious enough for both of us, you know" he shrugged his shoulders. "Sun…" she hissed menacingly.
"What do you want me to tell you, Blake? I've told you so many times already. I am here, alive. And it's all thanks to you, you know. If it wasn't you, I would probably have ended up as a freaky lab monkey or something." A groan was the only reply "Your puns are worse than Yang's; I will talk to her about how much of a bad influence she is."
Sun exhaled deeply. "My point is; I owe you my life Blake. If not for you, I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't have the chance to spend the happiest year of my life so far with you. I would be dead. And I can't still understand why you keep focusing on this" he pointed at his chest "and not on the rest of me, who is still breathing because of you."
At this point, the woman had lowered her head, ears totally flattened on the top of her head. "You are right…" she murmured "it's just…the feeling of my blade cutting you down, your blood on the floor… the scream of pain…so hard to forget…" she massaged her head to relax, her breath coming out in short, forced gasps.
A pair of strong arms wrapped themselves around her, filling her with warmth that she very silently appreciated. As Sun felt her relaxing in his arms, he continued "as usual, you are so harsh on yourself. You are making incredible progress; after the battle, you couldn't sleep at night. I still remember waking up seeing you struggle with the bed sheets."
"Sorry about that…" He rubbed her back "but look at you now- you have been in so many missions with no issues, unless Ruby is lying to us." The girl rolled her eyes "She can't lie to save her life."
"Exactly; this is the first episode you had in three months- and you were fighting me; which is the closest thing to that experience you had, Blake! You are doing great; give yourself some credit for once!" They broke the hug and, to his delight, she quickly pecked him on the lips "I-" he kissed her back, interrupting her once more, happy to see her this time returning the favor.
-o-
The school cafeteria was empty, except for the few vending machines, as Blake got in and sat down on a table. Her long dark hair was being tied up in a ponytail, leaving her soft-looking cat ears visible for everyone to see. She wore her combat outfit; low-heeled black boots with a purple pair of pants and a button-up white jacket on top.
A long black overcoat with white buttons hung form her shoulders and Nightfall hung from her metal belt's right, along with a pair of black leather gloves and her low-caliber black handgun, Envelop, on her left. A large burn mark spread all over the base of her neck up to her cheek and a single gold ring adorned her right hand.
Enjoying the peaceful atmosphere, she opened up her scroll to check on the morning news before delving into her book. Unlike her team's trending couple, she shared Ruby's view of not wanting to interact with fans if possible.
Therefore the popularity team RWBY had gotten after their return from Salem's stronghold, both good and bad, unnerved her a little bit, making her frequent this place only during classes. She grabbed a bite from her tuna sandwich, her eyes falling on one of today's headlines.
"FENRIS STRIKES AGAIN! ANOTHER CARAVAN LOST TO THE NOTORIOUS FAUNUS BANDIT!"
Blake waved her head in sadness. Gray Fenris was a former White Fang Lieutenant in Atlas who, after the disband of the organization, gathered a small group of like-minded faunus around him. However, unlike her father's White Fang and even Sienna's up to some point, his band was nothing more than a group of bandits who mercilessly killed human and faunus alike, stealing all sorts of precious cargo.
She was very keen on the idea of locating and bringing him to justice, but the wolf-man was very elusive, constantly on the move for the last two years. Of course, both the Atlasian and Valean military had decided to not actively deal with him and placed a large bounty on his head instead, resulting in the deaths of quite the number of mercenaries and huntsmen who foolishly tried to sniff him out.
Not even a world-scale war can change the nature of humans or faunus, after all. How sad… her mind drifted to the children at class today and the disgusted looks pointed at her and Sun in the end of the lesson.
A few years ago, they would be the majority of the class…at least things are looking a little better in that aspect. The possibility of others holding back because it was me and not some non-name faunus is very high, of course… suddenly getting reminded of something, she opened her contact list and hastily texted a message.
She put it down and turned around to- the emergency signal sound forced her to pick it up again.
"Team RWBY is to report to my office immediately."
She looked at her half-filled cup, gulped down the rest of the tea and gracefully moved towards the Beacon Tower. Passing by the combat classroom, she could have sworn she heard Ruby's cheerful voice from the inside.